Laurențiu Vlad

Laurențiu Vlad is Professor at the Faculty of Political Sciences of the University of Bucharest (since 2004). He holds a doctorate in history (1999, specializing in the history of mentalities) from the Institute of Southeast European Studies of the Romanian Academy. He was Vice-Rector of the University of Bucharest (January 2016-December 2019) and Secretary of State for University Education at the Ministry of National Education and Scientific Research (July 2016-January 2017). His fields of expertise are: the history of Romanians in Europe in the 19th and 20th centuries (imagology and imaginary national identity; cultural diplomacy; formation of elites) and the history of mentalities, political ideas and ideologies (conservatism, European idea, the image of the other).

The project

Title: Romanian students in Paris (second half of the 19th century - first half of the 20th century): towards a cross history in an inter-imperial context

"This research project examines the education of Romanian elites in the faculties of law, arts, medicine and science at the University of Paris between the second half of the 19^th century and the early 20^th century, during the formation of the Romanian nation-state and the realignment of the European geopolitical landscape. By drawing on the tools of cross-historical analysis and the concepts of inter-imperialism and periphery, it analyses the asymmetrical relations between France and Romania, as well as the dynamics of the circulation of knowledge and institutional models.

Based on the analysis of French archival sources, the research of Pierre Moulinier, and a methodology combining quantitative and qualitative approaches, the project aims to reconstruct the trajectories of Romanian students educated in Paris and to assess their role in the political, administrative and cultural transformations of modern Romania."

Hosting institution: The PLIDAM laboratory (Pluralité des Langues et des Identités : Didactique, Acquisition, Médiations) at INALCO in Paris

Selective Bibliography

1. Books

• Studenţi români la Universitatea Liberă din Bruxelles (a doua jumătate a veacului al XIX-lea – prima parte a secolului al XX-lea) / [Romanian students at the Free University of Brussels (second half of the 19th century – first half of the 20th century)], Iași, Institutul European, 2014, 229 pp.
• Images de l'identité nationale. La Roumanie aux expositions universelles et internationales de Paris (1867-1937), Paris, L'Harmattan, 2016, 282 pp.
• Istorii românești ale ideii de Europa, secolele XVII-XXI (imagini, note reflecții) / [Romanian Histories of the Idea of Europe, 17th–21st Centuries (Images, Notes, Reflections)], Iași, Institutul European, 2021, 340 pp.

2. Articles, chapters:  

• « Aux portes de l’Orient ». Quelques notes sur les images orientales de la Roumanie et des Roumains aux expositions universelles de Paris, 1867-1937, in „Südost-Forschungen” (Internationale Zetschrift für Geschicte, Kultur und Landeskunde Südosteuropas), 77, 2018, pp. 176-197.
• Brief notes on the education of a young Wallachian boyar. Constantin N. Brăiloiu and his studies in Sibiu, Geneva and Paris (1822-1832) în Social and Administrative Elite in the Romanian Space 15th-19th centuries, edited by Mihai-Bogdan Atanasiu and Cristian Ploscaru, Konstanz, Hartung - Gorre Verlag, 2021, pp. 141-154.
• Andrei Popovici, a Romanian diplomat in the United States of America during the New York World's Fair (1939-1940), in „Brukenthal Acta Musei”, XIX 1, 2024, pp. 131-141.